Wednesday, March 30, 2011

Sotheby's Hands Back the Listing for the W Hollywood Residences

Maybe only about seven people outside of Los Angeles care about the particular turn of events we're about to dish on, but the real estate telephone wires in Lala Land have been burning up with scandal the last few days and we feel like opening up a line of discussion on the matter amongst any concerned, curious or otherwise nosy citizens.

Your Mama first heard this juicy bit of bizness last Friday while holed up at the Ace Hotel in Palm Springs where we hid out for a few extra (and unplanned) days from the dusty and near-deafening construction zone that was–and still is–Your Mama and the Dr. Cooter's modest cottage in the Hollywood Hills.

From what Your Mama heard from some of our better connected sources over the last few days, Sotheby's International Realty semi-quietly and unceremoniously handed back the once-plum listing for the entire W Hollywood Residences project, a brand-new residential condominium tower in the heart Hollywood connected to the brand new, a-bit-too-glitzy and highly-stylized W Hotel Hollywood on the storied corner of Hollywood and Vine.

In an effort at journalistic integrity, Your Mama reached out to Russ Filice, the well-known lead agent from Sotheby's on the project, who would only confirm that S.I.R. will no longer be involved with the W Hollywood Residences after the 15th of April.

At that point, it seems, the high-toned brokerage will wash their hands of the not exactly successful project that has not exactly been embraced by the real estate community and the sorts of snooty design-philes who give two whits about the newly constructed hotel/condo complex. Well-heeled buyers have also, it seems, rejected the high-priced condominium because according to two of Your Mama's informants only 10 of the 143 luxury units have closed escrow. Those bone marrow-chilling numbers sound even worse when y'all consider that the W Hollywood Residences have been on the market for around a year and a half. Boo! Does that scare the real estate daylights out of anyone else?

Although we once gobbled up a couple of delicious gin & tonics in the grandiosely-scaled lobby of the W Hotel with our pal LeeahndruhLivesinahightower, Your Mama asks that all the children keep in mind that we have never stepped foot in one of the condos. Not. One. Foot. What we're saying, of course, is that we don't know diddly squat about we're talking about here. Okay? Anyhoo, on with the show anyway. According to more than one big-shit real estate agent we know in Los Angeles, the W Hollywood Residences contain far too many very expensive units–they range from around $450,000 to $3,500,000 for a penthouse pad–that feature impossibly awkward and poorly positioned elements such as structural columns running up the center of rooms. The children might be amused and/or outraged to know that there are not, according to plans presented on project's website, any closets in the (one) bedroom of unit 4L. Nearly half a million clams for a one-bedroom crib in the heart Hollywood and Your Mama has to parade our fat ol' ass past the plate-glass windows in the living room to snatch on a pair of knickers? Uh, no.

Those sorts of architectural bungles and snafus tend to really perturb deep-pocketed potential buyers looking at fancy contemporary condos with–an agent pal we know snitched–high monthly fees of more than $1.10 per square foot. Adding insult to the injury of high maintenance fees are the (allegedly) shrinking building services that conspire to keep the caps on the escrow paper signing pens of potential buyers. Porejemplo: well-to-do residents of the condos, we were told by an informant in a position to know, we're promised private valet services. But alas, abysmal sales have resulted in reduced revenues that have in turn forced cuts in the white-glove-y services for the condo portion of the complex.

Condo residents, we understand, are now forced to wait in line with hotel guests to have their automobiles brought around by the valet. Imagine, hunny bears, the horror of having to stand behind large-butted Jerry Nebraska in a pair of plaid Bermuda shorts as he waits for the valet to bring around his rented, teal-colored Chevy Lumina. Your Mama does not care to valet our big BMW if we can help it so we wouldn't care much about this parking situation but for many Angelenos for whom valet parking is like a religion, this inconvenience is a revolting proposition.

Making matter worse, we're told, is that some of the staging in one or more of the model units is questionable, an issue that further turns off potential buyers. Yesterday, an admittedly half in the bag neighbor we'll call Willy Winedrinker dished to Your Mama that one of the staged model units has a stripper pole and platform installed in the living room. That's right, a God damn stripper pole. We can not and will not go there, children, so do not even ask Your Mama to get started on this never ever acceptable stripper pole as day-core issue because we will blow a damn gasket.

As far as we know–and we really don't know a pistachio from a vacuum–no replacement has yet to be been chosen to succeed Mister Filice. What remains to be seen, of course, is if there's any real estate agent in Los Angeles who can turn that seemingly sinking ship around before it goes down like the Titanic. Has anyone called toothy and hard-charging Josh Altman (Hilton & Hyland) from Bravo's Million Dollar Listing? Yay? Nay? Anyhoo, We make no predictions, assumptions and assertions about what will transpire but Your Mama is quite certain that all the Real Estate Chicken Littles in Tinseltown peed their pants with glee over the possibility that the much-hyped and greatly-anticipated project might go down in a hot and public conflagration of failure and bankruptcy. We shall see butter churners, we shall see.

26 comments:

Has the W hotel brand become a cliche? The 28 story W Boston project has faced a similar fate. The developer filed for bankruptcy in the fall and after over a year of marketing only 29 of 123 condos have been sold. The hotel portion of the building was sold this week to an outside investment group for a bargain $89 million.

Wasn't it "Million Dollar Listing's" Chad (from Hilton & Hyland) who supposedly sold one of the units a season or two ago, for an outrageous amount of money? If the sale was real - and not just staged for the show - I really feel for the poor buyer.

I find it interesting your Mama mentioned Josh Altman from "Million Dollar Listing", but failed to mention at all the episode from a season or two ago where scary-haired Chad Rogers allegedly sold a unit in this building for (if I remember correctly) $5-million (and I do remember correctly thinking to myself at the time "really?" and "that project is so going to tank...")...makes one wonder if that sale even really went through (or was just a contrivance for TV purposes), or if it fell through since the episode aired...Also, how funny now that they built a whole 2 or so episode arc around how Creepy Chad supposedly used his charm and charisma(though personally, I never found him anything but disturbing and awkward)to get the listing brokers at the time to give him the listing for the prestigious unit, and how his getting such a "hot" listing, which now it seems noone wants to touch with a ten-foot pole...

I'm sure the failure is a bit more about pricing and the market. The floorplans while not amazing aren't all horrible... yes the closetless bedroom unit is a serious infraction, but the "support columns" which are far to thick to be a stripper pole are fairly common and oddly placed in many, many, many high rises nation wide that still sell successfully.

I couldn't bother to examine all the floor plans, but the ones I did look at all seemed to have a kitchen open to the living room or whatever it is called. So that cooking odors will permeate the air enveloping the assembled guests, I presume. Medieval peasants used to live in their kitchens of course, but I thought that after a thousand years or so, we might have moved up and away from that.

I'm sure that it is set up as a separate LLC so bankruptcy (not to be confused with foreclosure) is always an option. It is a good way to write down the debt. I'm sure that they didn't leverage other properties to build this one.

About Million Dollar Listing - the three story beachfront that Madison supposedly sold is a block from my place in Malibu, so I looked it up. The unit is still in the original (doctor) owner's name who supposedly sold it for 5 mill or so. The truth seems to be that much is staged. Oh my God, a reality show that is not real???!!!

Considering the number of foreclosures/short sales/underwater units at The Broadway & that other one at Hollywood & Vine, it's not surprising that the much more expensive W can't unload inventory. Seems like the W is intent on trying to attract the Entourage-crowd (there's even a restaurant by that name on the first floor) and like Joshua said, they just can't afford to actually buy at those prices.

The floor plans aren't bad, including 4L with no closet in the bedroom - that unit is basically a glorified studio - and the columns in weird locations is pretty standard for any high rise building.

The problem is, when you think about it, that's just a crappy location in the middle of touristville. So, the issue here which will be extant no matter who is listing the properties (which I am sure is why SIR booted it) is the prices are just unrealistic. LA is not a cheap place to live, but for that kind of money, there are a lot of options for SFRs all over the place, not to mention financing is much easier for SFRs than condos these days, especially considering the listing to closed escrows ratio.

Who knows what will happen here, but as I am sure this project is under a multi-layered LLC scenario, there's a good chance the developer files for bankruptcy and moves along. The real losers here will be the owners who have already closed escrow.

What I can see being likely, is an investor picking up the remaining units at a bankruptcy sale and turning them into rentals.

Hopefully they replace Million Dollar Listings with Selling L.A.Like the NYC Show, maybe they could recruit some top R.E. Professionals and stick with the business, rather then the personal crap that took over current show.

I checked these out a while back. The kitchens are essentially useless but these are meant for the young and rich to use as pied a terre apartments. The lure I think was supposed to be the idea of having a nightclub, pool, gym etc. just a short walk away. But as commenter8 said above, the location isn't perfectly fashionable.

SFR are very popular in L.A. The weather is so great 11 months of the year that people love having outdoor space and there are so many great neighborhoods just a few minutes from shops and restaurants where the same amount of money will get you a whole lot more space and privacy.Besides, the W brand was so ultra-trendy that it was bound to become passe very quickly.

The W Residences Downtown Atlanta are suffering a worse fate. I work a block away and can see the condo units from my office. Supposedly they had sold 9 of 74 residences before dropping prices 30% last year. I can count only 2 occupied units on the east side of the building. The AJC recently did a story on the couple that bought 1 of the penthouse units. They virtually have the condo portion of the building to themselves. Seems kind of creepy to me. The building itself, which houses a W hotel on the lower floors, recently was sold at foreclosure. The overall market in Atlanta is in the pits with a huge overabundance of condos, especially in the high-end range. Here's a link to some pics and info on the foreclosure. (I have no relation to the linked blog) http://www.atlantaskyriseblog.com/category/downtown/w-residences/

Josh Altman should take that listing. He specializes in listing properties that dont sell. He just takes it to take a listing. he is such a clown. He wishes he was doing business like brandon williams, not to mention drew or mauricio. He should join century 21.

Addendum to my last post...One has to laugh raucously at the wording on said W Residences website: "Few properties have been created with as much thought, insight, innovation and artistry as ours."

WHO ON EARTH would want an apartment with a whacking great column (even if dressed with mirrors) slap bang in the middle of your living or bedroom ? Was this designed by an architect or a circus tent maker ?

One wonders what other abortions have messers MARTY COLLINS and CLARK HANRATTIE (Developers) brought to the world ? Momma, can you interweb fingers find out ?